The Alliance for Childhood today warned that states considering adopting the new academic core standards released on June 2 could set in motion a spate of inappropriate and harmful testing of young children.

A marked decline in unstructured play, especially outdoors, is a key factor in children’s increasing mental health problems, an international group of educators and children’s advocates says. Their statement, published on Monday in England’s Daily Telegraph, calls for “a wide-ranging and informed public dialogue about the intrinsic nature and value of play in children's healthy development.”

A newly released United Nations report card on the state of children’s well-being, which places the United States and the United Kingdom at the bottom of the list of 21 wealthy countries, is “just scratching the surface of a growing crisis in children’s health,” says the head of the U.S. Alliance for Childhood.

A group of the nation's most prominent psychiatrists, child development authorities, and educators called today for President Bush and Congress to "rethink the current rush to make American children take even more standardized tests."